The reason it worked in THE DARK KNIGHT was because there was some subtlety to Ledger's performance. He won a damn Oscar. This guy was, as you said, basically just hamming it up, but the role didn't really call for that. He clearly had no idea how to play this character, and so he chose what is now the generic "weird voice", but didn't even do that very well.

The reason it worked in THE DARK KNIGHT was because there was some subtlety to Ledger's performance. He won a damn Oscar. This guy was, as you said, basically just hamming it up, but the role didn't really call for that. He clearly had no idea how to play this character, and so he chose what is now the generic "weird voice", but didn't even do that very well.